Time Predictions: Understanding and Avoiding Unrealism in Project Planning and Everyday Life

by Torleif Halkjelsvik (Creator)

Predicting the time needed to complete a project, task or daily activity can be difficult and people frequently underestimate how long an activity will take. This book sheds light on why and when this happens, what we should do to avoid it and how to give more realistic time predictions. It describes methods for predicting time usage in situations with high uncertainty, explains why two plus two is usually more than four in time prediction contexts, reports on research on time prediction biases, and summarizes the evidence in support of different time prediction methods and principles. Based on a comprehensive review of the research, it is the first book summarizing what we know about judgment-based time predictions.Large parts of the book are directed toward people wishing to achieve better time predictions in their professional life, such as project managers, graphic designers, architects, engineers, film producers, consultants, software developers, or anyone else in need of realistic time usage predictions. It is also of benefit to those with a general interest in judgment and decision-making or those who want to improve their ability to predict and plan ahead in daily life. This work was published by Saint Philip Street Press pursuant to a Creative Commons license permitting commercial use. All rights not granted by the work's license are retained by the author or authors.

Genres: Nonfiction

118 pages, Hardcover

Published October 8, 2020

Reviews

[Evan]

Very clear, concise, and insightful. The summaries are very helpful.

[Emma Que]

A+

A very technical and thoroughly researched approach to explaining why it is so hard for humans to effectively estimate time use. It's a shame they can't help us be more successful at it.

[Hendrick Mcdonald]

Exactly What It Promised To Be

The book is a play by play of different ways to gather time predictions, exploring the ways that lead to optimistic estimates vs pessimistic estimates.

[Krista Campisi]

Lit

Cool stuff really I enjoyed so muggy
Really loved I I I I I I I I I I I